Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Because if you remember correctly, I gave you full permission to hold me to my promise.

Okay, fine. I broke my promise.

BUT!

I put up two parts at once to try to get back in your good graces. Which you may or may not end up being grateful for since there are only eight parts and I'm giving you two at once. But here you go. And once again, I re-promise to put the next part up within a week. And this time, feel free to harass me on Facebook. Please. Because I completely forgot this last week.

Part 4 -

“Oh!
Were-wolves.” Sabine spent most of her time living among normal
humans, away from the changelings castle home-base, so some of the
'basic' changeling knowledge escaped her. “There've been more
sightings of were-wolves in the last month than I've heard in the
last three years put together.”

Oren
roused himself from thought, but the concerned crease in his brow
remained. “If you will excuse me, I have something to attend to.
Gregg, I would suggest you head back to your room and get a good long
rest. It's still early morning and I think this afternoon and tonight
are going to be very busy.”

Gregg
nodded smoothly. His every move was reminiscent of his last form. He
left for his room, his footsteps silent.

“Sabine,
would you accompany me to the hatching room?” Oren asked.

Sabine
also nodded, but much more excitedly.

Oren
smiled, amused. “The eggs in the hatching room are very fragile, my
dear. Perhaps it would be better if your temperament were a touch
calmer. A cat, possibly?”

Sabine
made a face. “Cats aren't really my thing.”

She
closed her eyes and concentrated. Her whole body lengthened, and
every feature smoothed out, as if her arms, neck, shoulders and legs
had been wiped flat. Her face lengthened and became diamond shaped.
Finally, her clothes were replaced by shimmering blue and purple
scales.

Coiling
herself, Sabine the boa constrictor flicked her forked tongue out,
smelling the air. One of the cats by the fireplace raised its head,
glanced at her and lazily laid back down.

“I
must say, you are one of the showiest boa constrictors I have ever
met.” Oren chuckled.

“Thanksssss.”
Sabine hissed, shivering herself to see the firelight dance of her
scales. “Jussst give me a sssecond.”

The
snake closed her eyes, and her head bobbed in a circle as she thought
hard. In a few moments, the change had reversed itself, leaving
Sabine with long, shiny black hair flowing down her back. She herself
was slightly taller and a little more willowy. When she moved, she
tended to take a curving motion instead of a straight path, and her
hair showed the slightest blue-purple undertone.

“Sshall
we go?” She asked, some of the after-effects still fading.

“Certainly.”
Oren led the way out of the room and through the maze of hallways.

After
a few minutes of walking, he put his finger to his lips and pushed
open a heavy door. Sabine followed him through and blinked in
surprise. It was very warm and dry inside. Other changelings in human
form moved around carefully carrying baskets of colorful eggs,
setting them in newly warmed nests. While Oren went to find someone
in the far recesses of the room, Sabine tried to keep from licking
her lips. The eggs looked to her still ever-so-slightly-snake-like
eyes like a heavenly feast.

“Snake!”
She hissed to herself angrily. “What was I thinking?!”

Part
5 -

After
gazing around hungrily for a few more moments, Sabine wisely, left
the hatchery, waiting just outside the door for Oren. He appeared
after about five minutes, glancing around for her.

“Ah.
There you are.” He said, then sighed heavily. “I'm afraid there's
a lot of work for me to do.”

“Why?”
Sabine asked smoothly. “Is something amiss?”

Oren
let the faintest smile flicker across his face. “You still speak
like a snake.”

“Is
that so?” Sabine said in surprise, unknowingly stretching her S's.

“Yes.
You chose word with lots of hissing noises.” He answered. “I'd be
glad to tell you exactly what's wrong, but it's a rather long and
involved story. However, I think it would behoove you if you found
Lady Fontaine and asked her for the Tale of Half-Changelings.”

Oren
nodded, not really paying her much attention as they split up. Sabine
moved down the hallways silently but quickly. Every once in a while,
the tiniest vibrations would travel through the stone floor, alerting
her to someone's presence. Sabine shook her head, trying to rid
herself of the snakley influence. Since she had not changed into one
for a while, it's influence affected her strongly and would take a
little while longer to wear off. If she did not change again for
several days, she would gradually lose all the after effects and
return to just Sabine, in appearance, personality, and movement.

She
stopped in front of a heavy wooden door and blinked, surprised she
had already arrived at the library. On the door was a sign:

The
Library of Lady Fontaine:

Changes
not allowed: Monkey, Elephant, Birds (excluding owls),

Skunks,
Ferrets, Kangaroos, and any water creature.

NO
CHANGING IN THE LIBRARY

Will
all those who have changed please leave the library to do any
personal business.

Beneath
the last part of the sign, someone had scrawled: “And those who
haven't changed too!”

Sabine
pushed the door open and entered quietly. A large black panther
glanced at her as it walked past with a large tome carefully held in
it's mouth. Sabine slipped past to find Lady Fontaine. Soon she
located her, a barn owl sitting at a desk in the back of the room.
She was swiveling her head all the way around and back again,
listening carefully. When she saw Sabine, she cocked her head almost
completely upside down.

“Sabine.
I haven't seen you in quite awhile.” She said quietly, her beak
clacking.

Sabine
was impressed. It was supposed to be very difficult for owls to speak
to non-changed because of their unique beak shape, but Lady Fontaine
was very good at it.

“Oren
sent me.” She explained. “He said to ask you for the Tale of the
Half-Changed.”

Lady
Fontaine blinked her large black eyes, then turned and took off
silently from the desk, swooping above the many, many bookshelves,
chattering softly to herself, “Tale of the Half-Changed. Heavy
reading. Dark times, then.”

After
a few minutes, she returned, dropping a large scroll into Sabine's
hands and alighting on the desk. “There you are, my dear. But, what
does Oren want with the Tale of the Half-Changed? He should remember
it.”

“He's
in it?” Sabine asked in surprise.

Lady
Fontaine churred softly, laughing. “Not only is he in it, dear, he
wrote it.”

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Beowulf, son Echtheow, spoke:
"Wise sir, do not grieve. It is always better
To avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning
For every one of us, living in this world
Means waiting for our end. Let whoever can
Win glory before his death. When a warrior is gone,
That will be his best and only bulwark.
(lines 1384-1389)

Okay.

First of all, I'd like to say that the previous book recommendations... however funny and interesting and involved those series are, they are basically fantasy fluff.

This is a really hard, deep book to read, and yes, I would recommend it. But it's one of the oldest manuscripts, and it was originally in Old English, a dead language. That means people can translate it and read it, but no one really speaks it any more to communicate.

This book, translated by Seamus Heaney, is a bilingual edition - on the left hand side you have the Old English, on the right hand pages you have the modern English. It's really fascinating, seeing the comparisons between the languages. For instance, the equivalent of daughter is, if memory serves, dochter. See? And the introduction at the beginning is interesting too, talking about the history of Beowulf, what translating it meant, and how poetic Beowulf really is.

Now, since this is such an old book, dated somewhere between the 8th and 11th century, it's not a terribly easy read, not at all, but in my opinion, if you can get through it, it is worth it. And if you've read Lord Of The Rings, The Hobbit, or The Inheritance Cycle, then you can really see the influence this story had on them. While he was still alive, J. R. R. Tolkien notably presented a lecture on Beowulf, and mentioned how it was among his most valued sources. And then there's Hrothgar, a main character in Beowulf, the one Christopher Paolini's dwarf king was named after.

When I first opened up Beowulf to read it, I saw the first lines:

So. the Spear-Danes in days gone by

And the kings who ruled them had courage and greatness.

We have heard of those princes' heroic campaigns.

And I just thought, "Wow. This is gonna be good."

And it was. A bit hard to get through, but still, I don't think I'll look back and think, "Oh, what a waste of time that was. Beowulf was useless. I could have done something else with my time." Which would be my opinion with some books.

There's my opinion on the book. Now a little bit about it.

Beowulf is mainly a story about a hero of the Geats in Scandinavia. He hears about the plight of King Hrothgar, whose mead-hall is under attack by the monster Grendel. Beowulf takes several of his best men and sails to meet Hrothgar, pledging to defeat the monster or die trying. Hrothgar welcomes him into his hall and Beowulf makes ready to battle Grendel.

I am not too great at synopses, am I?

In any case, I give it...

I'll say four stars. It was purty, purty good. Not the epic-est read-this-now-everybody-on-the-whole-world book, but worthwhile, I think, quite worthwhile.

Update: Oh, I forgot to mention. Yes, this was definitely written from a Christian viewpoint, for those of you who are concerned. But also I warn you, this gets a bit graphic in its descriptions, talking a little bit about bursting muscles and severed heads and bloody butchered corpses (Beowulf's words, not mine), so if you have a bit of a delicate constitution, you may not care to read it.

Saturday, May 18, 2013

Well, I haven't posted since April 5th. I'm a very mean person to leave you hanging like that. And so, to make it up to my (two?) readers, I will immediately post the next part of the Changelings story, with the answer to who "they" are.

A quick summary of where we are in the story, 'cause it's been over a month since I posted the last part.
Gregg, Sabine, Kay and Oren are changelings. They can change into animals. Gregg is bringing news to Oren in the sorta changeling headquarters, which is a large castle. Oren kind of runs the place.Kay is a bird changeling that Gregg got his news from. Sabine is Gregg's friend. Gregg had been running through the snow, all night long, as a cream colored cat. He was so tired, he couldn't finish his change and got stuck halfway between cat and human, but Oren fixed him up with a tonic. Sabine just changed back into a human from a wolf, so she's a bit excitable right now, borrowing from the dog-like personality she just had.
I think that pretty much covers it. Here's part three for your enjoyment!

>>>>>>>> Part Three <<<<<<<

Sabine
grinned back at Gregg. “You’re blonde.”

He
ran his fingers through his hair. “Well, I was cream colored.”

She
looked meaningfully at Oren. “You wanted to tell him something?”

He
winced and nodded. Turning to Oren he said, “Sir, one of our field
units reported movement. They seem to be migrating.”